Jungle Encounters
by riptidedarkphoenix
Summary: The Wild Man and the Man-Cub. A chance meeting. A bond formed deep in the jungle. Parent!Tarzan Parent!Jane. This started off as a collection of one shots; it might become more.
1. Chapter 1

**AN: WOWEE. I can't believe that there is only one story in this category.**

 **Personally, Tarzan is one of my favorite disney movies, and I just saw the new live-action (more like CGI Action) Jungle Book. So I decided to write this.**

 **The universe is obviously fanon, because I know that Africa and India are on separate continents.**

 **This takes place before both the Tarzan and Jungle Book movies.**

It was a particularly violent storm. It had come upon the apes without warning, the rain pelting, the river swelling, the sky shaking with noise and light. They apes had been traveling along a river prior to the storm's arrival. A river provided water and life, but not now. Not during the storm.

The apes huddled together under the trees, watching as the river grew larger and more dangerous, almost as if it were alive.

"MY CHILD! WHERE IS MY CHILD!?" One of the female apes cried out.

A nearby tree splintered under the force of the tropical storm and fell with a crash upon the river. The apes shrieked in fear.

"MY CHILD! THE TREE!"

The once mighty tree was still hanging onto the banks of the river by its roots. It's trunk stretched out perpendicularly across the pregnant river like a great wooden bridge. Lighting flashed, and the apes could see the small wet form of an infant gorilla, hanging on to a tree branch suspended feet above the river's raging surface.

Then there was another shape. It was heroically making it's way across the tree trunk to the infant gorilla. A man.

"Tarzan! Tarzan!" A cry rose up from the apes. Tarzan reached the gorilla and retrieved it from its perilous position. Gently, he placed it on the main trunk of the tree, and with a speed that had deserted it before, the baby gorilla ran across the tree up the bank and back to its mother.

Triumphant, Tarzan began to make his way back across the river as well. But with a great cracking noise, the roots of the tree began to fail in their fight against the river. Tarzan began to move faster, but the roots had already lost the battle and the tree was swept away in the storm.

...

Mowgoli had never seen anything quite like it before.

"It must be a baby elephant." He decided.

Cautiously, he approached the limp form lying on the banks of the river. He had heard quite a bit about Elephants before, but had never seen one up close.

A coughing groaning noise came from the creature. Mowgoli backed away into the jungle, hiding in the brush. It sat up, and preceded to use its hands to clear the tangled hair from his face.

' _Hands?'_ Mowgoli thought. ' _Only apes have hands like me. And that's not a monkey.'_

Mowgoli felt a pang of fear. The wolf pack was always warning him to stay away from the Man Village. What if this was a man from the Man Village?

The creature righted itself in a funny manner. Although it bore a shocking resemblance to Mowgoli, it seemed to prefer crouching to standing.

It tensed. It knew it was being watched. Rising up on two legs, it looked around defensively. Mowgoli didn't show himself, but he did ask a question.

"What are you?"

The creature started in surprise. It quickly identified the source of Mowgoli's voice.

"I am Tarzan." Tarzan responded.

Tarzan spoke the jungle tongue. That assuaged Mowgoli's fear and he exited the brush, trotting right up to Tarzan.

"I'm Mowgoli! I'm a man cub. I thought you were a man at first, because you have hands like me! But you don't stand like I do you…"

As Mowgoli chattered cheerfully, Tarzan stared at the conundrum in front of him. He had never seen another animal that moved like he could before. And he had never heard of this 'man.'

"Man? What's that?" Tarzan asked, interrupting the boy's stream of chatter.

"You don't know?" The man-cub's eye's widened. "Man has the red-flower. They are bad; they hurt the jungle. But I'm not bad, because even though I'm a man cub I've never even seen the red-flower."

"I don't know of the red-flower either. I've never even heard of man. Where am I?"

"The South Jungle! Where did you think you were? I get lost sometimes, then Bagheera has to find me. He says it's cause I'm a man cub and men-"

"Stop it. I am Tarzan of the apes. Do you know of the great apes?" Tarzan was getting a little annoyed.

Mowgoli stopped for a moment and squinted very hard at Tarzan.

"No, I think I'm pretty sure you're a man. In fact, I'm getting surer every moment. Don't worry, thought, you don't seem too bad."

Tarzan sighed. "I hope not. Do you know what lies upriver of here? I think it's where my family went." Tarzan squatted back down with his knuckles on the forest floor, looking around apprehensively.

"There are more men upriver?!" Mowgoli looked a little awed.

"No, I mean my ape family! I just told you that I haven't seen another man or man-cub before in my life!"

"Oh." Mowgoli looked a bit disappointed. "Sometimes I think I would be interesting to talk to the men. Like you. You're interesting."

"I am?" Tarzan didn't find himself very interesting.

"Yeah, though you're not like the other men I hear about from the wolves."

"Wolves?" Tarzan's questioned.

"Yes, I belong to the wolf pack. Even though I'm not a real wolf."

"The wolf pack of the South Jungle, I think I know where I am now." Tarzan took a few halting steps.

"I could take you to see the wolves! They would know how to get you back to your ape-family!" Mowgoli suggested.

Tarzan pondered the idea.

' _Wolves usually have a solid alpha as their leader. But If the Wolves of the South Jungle hate men, and that's what I am…'_

"I think I can get back on my own." Tarzan decided.

Mowgoli looked downright heart-broken.

"Will I see you again?" he whimpered.

Reaching out slowly, Mowgoli touched Tarzan's arm, and Tarzan jolted back.

Feeling guilty he supplied as honest an answer as he could,

"Probably not."

Tarzan turned and walked into the jungle, not glancing back until he was out of the boy's sight. The man-cub looked rather upset.

' _He'll get over it.'_ Tarzan thought to himself.

That's when Tarzan realized that he was feeling upset as well. Something instinctive inside of him wanted to stay with the man-cub. Protect him.

Tarzan shook his head side-to-side as if warding away a persistent fly.

' _I am not a man.'_ he berated himself, ' _I am Tarzan of the apes.'_


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: This new chapter takes place after the Jungle Book Movie and the Tarzan Movie.**

5 years. It had been five years since Tarzan had met that strange man-cub in the South Jungle. It had been two years since meeting Jane.

"What are you thinking about? You look so solemn." The woman in question, Jane, laid a gentle hand on Tarzan's shoulder.

The couple was standing on the balcony of their jungle treehouse. The treehouse where Tarzan had been found as a baby by the gorillas. The treehouse that he and Jane had renovated to accommodate a blend of jungle lifestyle with the comforts of home and civilization.

Solemn; serious or sad. It was English, a part of Man's language. Jane had taught it to Tarzan over the course of the past two years. Man's language was hard to learn, his customs and peculiarities even more so. It made Tarzan wonder what his life would have been like if he had been raised in the "civilized world," or even a man-village, like the one that the man-cub spoke of.

"I'm not the only one." Tarzan finally replied to Jane.

"The only what?"

"The only human who was raised in the Jungle."

Jane cocked her head to the side in confusion. "There are more like you? I thought you were the only surviving member of your family?"

"I passed through the South Jungle, once. There was a… man-cub. That's what he called himself. A man-cub. He said he lived with the wolves."

"Man-cub? Are you sure it wasn't just a hairless monkey?"

"There's a difference between humans and monkeys, Jane. Even then, I could tell that he was like me, but younger. He was just a …" Tarzan struggled to find the proper word one would use to describe a tiny human that had not reached adulthood yet.

"A child." Jane spoke softly, her face shifting to concern and worry. "There's a little child out in the Jungle somewhere!? We need to go find him!"

Tarzan smiled at Jane's immediate decision to take action. She was always so eager to try new things and help others. It was one of the many reasons why he had fallen in love with her.

"It was along time ago. He would be approaching the age of man now."

…

Tarzan hadn't thought about the man-cub in years. Now, he was wandering around the South Jungle looking for said man-cub at the insistence of Jane. Despite living in the Jungle for two years, Jane was beautiful and clumsy as always, and Tarzan was focusing more on keeping her in one piece than looking for the man-cub.

Jane had learned to navigate the Jungle surrounding her treehouse home exceptionally well, but as soon as she visited new territories, she would find herself getting into trouble in some way or the other.

"Hallo! Mowgli! Are you here?" Jane called as she trekked through the thick underbrush along side Tarzan.

Silence was the only response.

"Tarzan, do you know where the South Jungle Wolves live?"

"I'm not sure where their den is."

"Then how are we supposed to find them?"

"Just keep making noise and they'll find us." Tarzan smirked playfully.

"Oh stop it. At least i'm looking for this man-cub" Jane retorted.

The banter was cut short by a deep low growl. The growl of a wolf.

It came from across the small clearing where Jane and Tarzan were standing with their backs to a wall of nearly impenetrable jungle foliage.

"Jane, get behind me." Tarzan commanded in a voice almost as deep and menacing.

A pair of glowing eyes appeared in the underbrush, followed by another, and another. A sleek silver form crept out of the brush, hackles raised and teeth bared.

"Man is not welcome here." The wolf said in the Jungle tongue.

"Man, Man." The other wolves echoed.

"Leave or die." The silver Alpha wolf snarled.

"Die, die!" The wolves chanted.

"We mean no harm." Tarzan replied in the Jungle tongue.

The lead wolf paused.

"He speaks like the Jungle."

"Jungle, like the Jungle…" the other wolves muttered.

For a split second, Tarzan thought the wolves would relent, but the animal instincts took over, and they recommenced stalking towards him and Jane.

Tarzan crouched into a defensive position, ready to defend Jane and himself. Behind him, Jane had slowly picked up a sizable branch and was holding it like a bat, ready to swing.

"Stop!" A newcomer shouted. A newcomer who spoke with a voice of a man but in the language of the jungle.

The lead wolf stopped in it's tracks, swinging its head to the side to catch sight of none other than Mowgli.

The man-cub had grown over the last five years. Although he was still in his mid-teens, he was starting to look more like a man. He had lost the innocent, trusting quality that Tarzan had seen along time ago. Perhaps it was from living in the Jungle, isolated from human interaction. Perhaps it was from something worse.

"Tarzan?" Mowgli said tentatively. "Your name is Tarzan."

Tarzan nodded.

Mowgli glanced towards the wolves, motioning for them to leave, and the alpha growled.

"You care only for the men."

"Only for the men…" One of the wolves echoed.

"I will get rid of them. Please, leave." At Mowgli's pleading, the wolves slowly crept back into the brush.

Tarzan could still feel their eyes on him anyways.

"Why are you here?" Mowgli asked bluntly. "The wolves won't hold themselves back for long."

"Hi! You must be Mowgli!" Jane said brightly in English, dropping her branch and striding forward to meet Mowgli. "My name is Jane...Ja-ne." Jane carefully pronounced her name. "Ummm… Hi Jane." Mowgli replied in perfect English to a very shocked Jane. He then turned to Tarzan, and continued in English, "I thought you said there weren't any other men upriver."

Simultaneously, Jane turned to Tarzan and exclaimed, "I thought you said that the boy was raised by wolves and didn't speak English!"

Tarzan shrugged defensively under the accusing stares. "The last time I saw Mowgli was years ago! A lot can happen in that time."

Mowgli glanced suspiciously from Tarzan to Jane and back again.

"Well, Mowgli, the reason we came looking for you was because we thought you might want more, human, company. I mean, there's nothing wrong with the wolves, of course, but wouldn't you like to-" Jane started only to be interrupted.

"I tried living in the man village, I'm not going back!" Mowgli cut off Jane mid-sentence.

"The man village?" Tarzan asked.

"The animals decided I would be better off with my own kind. But in the man-village, I was rejected. I learned why the animals feared the men so much. I was treated like an animal myself, and I had to beg to stay alive. I didn't understand their customs and ways; I was an outsider. So I came back to the Jungle."

"But we won't treat you that way!" Jane insisted.

"He has the wolf pack, Jane." Tarzan said gently. "It's his choice to stay with them or not."

Mowgli ducked his head. "I don't have the wolves. Not anymore."

"What happened?" Jane enquired.

"When I came back from the man-village, the wolves treated me like I was dangerous. So did most of the other animals. I wasn't a part of the jungle anymore, not in their eyes. I'm not a part of the pack. But I'm not a part of man's world. I don't belong in either, and neither of them want me."

Tarzan was just starting to notice how thin and emaciated Mowgli looked; the teenager hadn't eaten well in along time. Tarzan wasn't sure if it was from begging on the streets or if it was from the neglect of the wolf pack. Both of the thoughts made him sick.

Tarzan had been different from the apes, but they hadn't rejected him. And now Mowgli was struggling with the same feelings of loneliness and isolation that Tarzan had struggled with as a child. The difference was, Mowgli had Tarzan and Jane.

Tarzan glanced over at Jane, who was silently pleading,

' _Can we keep him?'_

Tarzan moved a step closer to Mowgli, and slowly touched his arm. The teenager stiffened.

"I understand. The jungle is my home, and the apes are my family. But I still wanted to be with others like myself. I wanted to be loved by a human being, a person who could love me back. I didn't have that for a long time." Tarzan explained.

Jane spoke up again, walking slowly towards Mowgli, taking his hands.

"So we want to offer that to you, Mowgli. Not just a place to stay, but a home where you can be loved." And with that, Jane pulled Mowgli into a hug.

It was the first time Mowgli had been hugged by another human. Ever.

The teenager stiffened, his eyes going wide from the unexpected contact. He didn't push away or jerk back. Sluggishly, Mowgli moved his own arms to return the embrace.

"I'll take that as a yes." Jane whispered.


	3. Chapter 3

"So, I just sorta jump and grab? Sounds dangerous"

"Well… When you put it that way-"

"I don't like danger. Bagheera always told me not to take any risks."

"Just keep your eye on the vine, and watch out for any trees."

"Bagheera really wouldn't like this."

The teenage boy perched in the highest branches of the large jungle rainforest tree eyed the ground warily. It was an awful long ways away. The large man who perched next to him patted his back awkwardly.

"Pretend you're only a few feet off the ground and you'll be fine." Tarzan encouraged.

"That drop is more than a few feet." Mowgli muttered.

The vine that Mowgli was going to attempt to grab was only a couple of feet away, but to Mowgli, it felt like a few miles.

Because he was raised by wolves, Mowgli had spent a lot of time close to the ground, rarely climbing up in trees and attempting to swing from vines. Yet Tarzan insisted that it was necessary to learn how to navigate the trees like an ape.

Mowgli took a deep breath and readied himself to leap. Ignoring the ground hundreds of feet below, he launched himself off the branch with a scream, his eyes squeezed shut.

"MOWGLI! EYES ON THE VINE!" Tarzan shouted.

Mowgli forced his eyes open to see a indistinguishable haze of green rushing about him. In the middle of it all was the vine. A life line.

Mowgli's hands reached out and grabbed the vine, pulling it taunt. A jolting pain filled his shoulders as his momentum carried him forward through the air.

He wrapped his feet around the vine and let out an adrenaline filled scream as he soared through the air. Branches and leaves whipt past him, some cutting into his skin.

"TREE!" Came Tarzan's voice again.

Mowgli caught sight of the trunk of the rain forest tree, which was rapidly approaching.

He twisted back and forth like a fish on a line and managed to change his course enough to miss the tree trunk. The vine began to swing back towards Tarzan, but this time it was slowed as it became increasingly entangled in nearby branches.

Mowgli saw a large broad branch that he could land on, located a few feet away from where Tarzan was still standing.

Hesitatingly, Mowgli dropped from the organic green rope and landed on the wooden walk way.

Tarzan gave him a thumbs up and Mowgli, despite the shallow cuts on his arm, the sore shoulder, and the multiple near-death experiences, beamed happily.

"WHAT ARE YOU TWO DOING?!" The shrill voice rang out from below.

Mowgli and Tarzan glanced down to see Jane staring up with a horrified expression.

"You could have DIED! You could have fallen to a painful death and been paralyzed for the rest of your life and-"

"Jane." Interrupted Tarzan. "He is fine."

"Fine?!" Jane shrieked. "Tarzan, we agreed that we would do absolutely nothing to endanger this child! He trusts us to care for him, and then you go and tell him to jump out of a tree!"

"Child?" Mowgli huffed, rolling his eyes.

Frantically, Jane began to climb said tree, presumably so she could get to Tarzan and Mowgli and yell at them from a closer range.

"Jane, He is a natural." Tarzan argued.

Mowgli felt a strange swell of pride knowing that he had Tarzan's approval.

Tarzan grabbed a nearby vine and started to descend from the topmost branches, but Jane yelled for him to stop.

"You stay right there! No more vine swinging for you two!"

Mowgli was more than a little scared, and from the look on Tarzan's face, he was too. Jane-when-she-was-scared was a sight to see. Jane-when-she-was-scared-for-her- _family_ was even more terrifying.

Still, in the midst of all her anger, Jane was having trouble getting up the tree. Her foot was uncomfortably wedged in between two branches, the other dangling in mid air; her arms hugged the thick trunk of the tree as if it was her lifeline to the earth. On top of that, Jane had chosen that day, of all days, to wear the old and ripped yellow dress that she had brought with her from England.

"Jane, let me help you up." Mowgli insisted. Maybe if he was nice he could score some points with Jane and she would be less angry with him.

"You stay right there, Mowgli!" she said, shaking her finger at him. "We are going to have a long discussion about jungle safety and then we'll have a talk about-"

Mowgli never did find out what he and Jane would be discussing (besides jungle safety).

Jane had climbed very high in the tree; she was directly below Mowgli, who was several feet below Tarzan. At that moment, Jane had reached out for a cluster of vines, only to have them come loose as soon as she put her weight on them.

Mowgli guessed it would happen before Jane actually fell. Something about living in the Jungle his entire life had attuned him to the possible dangers around him.

Somehow, he knew that Jane was going to fall before she did- It was that sixth sense born and fine-tuned in the jungle that saved Jane's life.

As soon as the cluster of vines were ripped from the tree, Mowgli was in the air, flying towards Jane. He let gravity pull him downwards.

Faster.

One hand shot out and grabbed a vine. The other was reaching for Jane.

Faster.

Mowgli willed himself to move faster towards the woman that had taken him in.

His hand closed on faded yellow fabric.

He briefly registered that there was a chance that this vine could not support two people before feeling his shoulders jolt once again. Mowgli began to worry that his grip on the vine could not support two people.

Mowgli had slowed their fall considerably, but the momentum was still swinging the teenager and the woman through the air.

He didn't see the tree branch coming. The branch was thick and sturdy and right in Mowgli's swing path.

THUD

It got him right in the stomach. The shock from hitting the thick wood branch knocked all the air out of Mowgli's body, and effectively got him to release his death grip on the vine.

Suddenly, Mowgli was free falling once again.

He couldn't help but think that Jane was probably right- he was going to fall to a painful death. His only regret however, was that Jane was going to fall too, and he was pitifully unable to save her. The ground was getting horribly close.

Then, strong arms wrapped around Mowgli and Jane.

Tarzan.

Easily, as if it were child's play, and gracefully, like a panther, Tarzan swooped from above, catching Mowgli with one arm, and gripping Jane with his legs.

He deposited the scared teenager and the flustered woman gently on the ground.

Jane sank to her knees, attempting to process what had just happened.

"I- I think I'm going to be motion-sick." Mowgli announced, collapsing next to her.

Instantly Jane shot back to her feet

"Mowgli, are you alright?" she asked worriedly, surveying the "child" for damage.

Mowgli's shoulders were hurting and he was pretty sure he was in a little bit of shock, but he recovered quickly and nodded.

"Mowgli, you saved me! Thank you so much!" Jane cried, embracing the teen.

"Jane, are you alright?" Tarzan asked, placing a hand on his wife's cheek

Jane rounded on him quickly, shoving his hand away.

"It's your fault that this happened!" She accused. "Mowgli could have died trying to save me because I slipped and fell out of tree!"

"Um, I saved both of you." Tarzan pointed out.

"But it's your fault that I was in the tree! This only goes to prove my point. And it's your fault that I slipped!"

"It… Is?" Tarzan asked, confused.

Jane got a bit carried away in her angry accusations. "You started this whole thing with your silly acrobatic stunts! From now on, if I so much as see you and Mowgli anywhere near a vine…"

The rant continued on in this fashion for several days.

Admittedly, it did stop Tarzan from taking Mowgli up into the trees for another vine swinging lesson.

When Mowgli asked Tarzan about it, Tarzan said,

"When I saw you jump off that branch to save Jane, I realized that you did not need lessons. You are a natural."

"But I couldn't save Jane." Mowgli pointed out.

"It was a matter of strength. Your body was simply not strong enough to carry that much weight on one arm."

"But I had a grip on the vine. I had it, and then I started to fall and I tried to hold on but I just couldn't do it. That stupid tree branch hit me. I needed you to save both of us in the end."

"You slowed down Jane's fall. It gave me an important few seconds to react. It gave me the time to save Jane."

"I guess. It's too bad I can't practice anymore vine swinging without Jane killing me now." Mowgli complained with an apathetic shrug.

For a moment, Tarzan was remorsefully silent. Then, he looked around quickly to make sure Jane was not in sight. A sly smile lit up his face as he suggested, "There is this other thing I do called vine-surfing. I should show you how to do it some time..."


End file.
